Here at Charm City Wed, we don’t often spotlight vendors or businesses that aren’t a part of our collective, but this is one business that we just had to make sure you all know about! We love to support small business and encourage everyone to buy local if possible, and this company allows couples preparing for their wedding buy local for a variety of wedding goods.

Introducing: Locally Made Weddings! Created by Natasha Sierakowski, Owner & Lead Makeup Artist at Maryland Wedding Makeup, she identified a niche in Baltimore that needed to be filled and we couldn’t be more excited!

We sat down with Natasha recently and asked her to tell us about this new local resource:

• Tell us a little about Locally Made Weddings! What inspired you to start the site?
  It started as a simple idea for local Baltimore artists to sell items specific to the wedding industry in Baltimore. It’s a great way to work as a local ‘team’ verses their product drowning in listings on other national websites. The best part is that our customers can easily shop between all listings and have one shopping cart verses ordering items separately between vendors. This saves time and money, which when planning a wedding, is always top priority.

• Why buy local versus buying from a national handmade goods site?
  To start, you are supporting a variety of small business owners, including stay at home moms, art students, and women business owners right here in Baltimore. Keeping the money local is always a better choice then sending it overseas, which is really where your money goes shopping large retailers. It saves time since our vendors can customize most orders. A simple meeting over coffee in Canton can get you exactly what you want verses surfing through thousands of listings online. You can also opt to pick up most items which saves you a lot of money on shipping.

• What kinds of vendors & goods are available on LMW?
  As of today, we are featuring vendors in categories like Jewelry, Gifts, Accessories, and Decor. Our vendors vary from full time businesses that want to offer an extension their goods and services to local artists who have created one of a kind items. My favorite item at the moment is an awesome “Welcome to Baltimore” tote, which customers can order as favors for out-of-town guests.

• How can local wedding vendors get involved / sell their goods on the site?
  All they have to do is click on the Join Up link on our website. The entire process from storefront set up to posting listings is moderated by me to keep the website uniform. We’re looking for vendors of all types, so if you make something, live local, and its for the wedding industry– message me! :) We are a team, after all, and that’s what makes Locally Made Weddings one of a kind!